City Analysis

How can one perform an urban analysis clustered to allow cities to be viewed through an Environmental Lens, a Social Lens, and an Economy & Governance Lens, and then integrated to combine all relevant disciplines and cover the complete spread of perspectives?

City Analysis Methodology

The rise in the influence of sustainability principles has resulted in an almost overwhelming number of ways of defining, measuring and assessing sustainability. For sustainability measurement to be accurate it must have a clearly defined ‘sustainability space’, be designed for the context in which the measurements are to be taken, evidence a clear causal chain and make explicit interdependencies. The degree to which current sustainability methods meet these criteria is varied.

Cities play an important role in a country’s ability to become more sustainable. In order for cities to move towards sustainability, it is important first to understand how they function and how well they perform. This provides a baseline against which to identify and prioritise aspects that would benefit from change and assess the impact of any proposed solutions. Gaps in performance can then be identified, barriers to achieving a sustainable future elucidated and robust solutions designed and assessed. Care must be taken, however, that in moving towards a more sustainable future the liveability of cities is not compromised.

The City Analysis Methodology (CAM) is an innovative urban analysis framework for holistically measuring the performance of UK cities with regard to well-being, resource security and CO2 emissions. It demonstrates the need for, and defines the parameters for, sustainability solutions (decisions being made now in the name of sustainability) that do not compromise wellbeing and provides a model for other countries to leverage the sustainability of their cities.

Resources

Their impacts on wellbeing and economic development are complex due to their interplay with national regulations and internationally negotiated treaties. Our rapidly expanding resource use has created environmental impacts that present us with the most challenging agendas for the 21st century. Proceeding with existing production methods and consumption habits, exacerbated by the ever increasing global engines of growth, will further erode our scarce resources increasing pollution, contributing to and creating global economic instabilities. Hence, transformative solutions to low-carbon resource production combined with demand reductions will need to be at the core of our policies, not only to address resource scarcity but also the impact of our changing climate.

To fully understand how energy, water, waste and food flow within and through our cities we need to consider not only their quantities, but also the reasons for their movement (what is causing their demand), who is paying for them and who controls them. In this way we not only understand how an energy source such as oil moves into, around and out of cities, but also what forms it takes (e.g., gasoline), what those forms are used for and hence how it is consumed (e.g., to power cars) and why the demand for those forms exists (e.g., to travel to work).

We must also understand the need for these resources in the first place, how locally controlled resources increase (or otherwise) resource security, the need for and use of local materials, and alternative paradigms for resource security.

Ecosystem Services

Urban living is currently made possible through the goods and services derived from both local and distant natural systems, often subsidised by the extensive use of fossil fuels. For example, crops are typically farmed outside of cities, with fossil fuels underpinning the fertilization of soils, crop harvesting and processing, transport to consumers and the removal of the resulting waste. Urban living is also made more liveable by natural systems within and adjacent to cities. Parks provide accessible recreational space, whilst allotments can facilitate community development. Green spaces have health benefits as well, such as removing pollutants from the air. Biodiversity underpins many of these benefits and changes to the diversity of natural systems may alter their ability to supply key services.

Transitioning to low-carbon living is likely to affect how key services are supplied, with potential positive and negative impacts on wellbeing. Green areas and parks will potentially increase in importance as they provide cooling (e.g., shading from trees, cooling effects of lakes and fountains) as summers get warmer with climate change

There is therefore a need to fully understand how ecosystem services and the biodiversity that underpins them are currently delivered to cities; and to explore how these might change in a low-carbon, resource secure future. It is also important to explore how natural systems can play a (vital) role in successfully delivering these future cities.

This little book tells you about research that we did as part of the Liveable Cities project, looking at sharing in cities. Through a series of conversations with researchers and workshops with citizens of Lancaster and Birmingham in 2015, we conclude that:
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The Future Urban Living Policy Commission took evidence from a wide range of leading thinkers on cities from the UK and elsewhere, drawing from it ideas that might inform the way that we live, work and play in the cities and towns of the future. It then tested these ideas...

The successful movement of individuals is fundamental to life. Facilitating these movements by promoting ecological connectivity has become a central theme in ecology and conservation. Urban areas contain more than half of the world's human population, and their potential to support biodiversity and to connect their citizens to nature is...

As the global population urbanizes, dramatic changes are expected in city lighting and the urban form, which may threaten the functioning of urban ecosystems and the services they deliver. However, little is known about the ecological impact of lighting in different urban contexts. Movement is an important ecological process that...

Tree planting is widely advocated and applied in urban areas, with large-scale projects underway in cities globally. Numerous potential benefits are used to justify these planting campaigns. However, reports of poor tree survival raise questions about the ability of such projects to deliver on their promises over the long-term. Each...

Artificial lighting is strongly associated with urbanisation and is increasing in its extent, brightness and spectral range. Changes in urban lighting have both positive and negative effects on city performance, yet little is known about how its character and magnitude vary across the urban landscape. A major barrier to related...

Paper to be delivered to International Symposia for Next Generation Infrastructure (ISNGI) 2015

The above-named paper is to be delivered by Prof Chris Rogers at the 2015 meeting of the ISNGI in September 2015. The full paper will be made available via conference proceedings following the conference. You can find out...

When thinking about urban ecosystem services, the city’s trees are high on the list of habitats that contribute directly to human wellbeing. They are the Swiss Army Knife of urban habitats – a multi-functional feature that needs to be understood, retained and...

The City Analysis Methodology (CAM) metrics are intended to describe city performance with regard to resource security, low-carbon living and wellbeing. Over the course of the research programme, it has became clear that measuring the performance at the sub-city level is particularly useful for city...

An exciting opportunity to work on the EPSRC-funded research project Liveable Cities, a multi-disciplinary project combining researchers from a wide range of disciplines, including social science, engineering, environmental science and urban studies.

Reporting directly to the Principal Investigator (Professor Chris Rogers), the research fellow will focus on urban metabolism (i.e. the...

A ‘lens framework’ for the CAM has been established, based upon the three pillars of sustainability plus governance. This reflects the UK Government’s approach to sustainability as well as drawing in contextual priorities identified in the literature review (built and natural environment,...